When I drive to work, I listen to the radio so I can stay awake.  Typically, I listen to WMUZ, an advertiser-supported religious radio station.  I have my issues with several WMUZ advertisers; this time I want to address one commercial I’ve been hearing more recently.  The advertiser?  A cosmetic surgery establishment.

The commercial started positively enough, with a woman saying, “I’m confident in who I am in Christ.”  This is a good and worthy sentiment; the problem was that it was not the end statement, but simply a means to an end.  She then used that confidence to explain that her decision to utilize the services of the surgeon was a “personal decision” between her and God.  After that, she was done with God-related statements; the rest of the commercial was, obviously, centered on the establishment and its excellence.

Perhaps I am a dense man, but I cannot yet understand how confidence in identity in Christ connects to cosmetic surgery.  Does cosmetic surgery for those with no genuine physical problems originate from or demonstrate true confidence in Christ?  I have a hard time believing that concept.

Needless cosmetic surgery seems to be an effort to remake ourselves in our own images — not our God-given images, but the images we’ve created in your head, the images influenced by the societies around us.  Altering ourselves to generate happiness with our physical appearance communicates not “I praise you, God, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made,” but something more like, “God, thanks, but I think You didn’t quite get this right.”  That is not an expression of full confidence; if it expresses anything, it is heavily qualified confidence at best.

If we believe confidence in Christ requires alteration, these changes ought to occur not in our appearance, but in our perceptions and values.

On a different, but related, topic, the beginning of this advertisement highlights another problem: needless commercial invocation of God.  Please, advertisers, do not gratuitously invoke God in spots for bankruptcy attorneys, cosmetic surgeons or malpractice attorneys.

Important note: I do not know the woman who chose to participate in an advertisement for the cosmetic surgeon; this post is not meant to suggest that she is somehow a horrible person.  Her comments in the advertisement simply sparked a lot of thought in my mind.